I am throwing myself into the fire and doing what I do best...dancing. I don't know how to do this any other way. Can't be anyone but me and that is ok with me because I like me.
Doesn't mean that I haven't been him but I have been more restrained. I haven't let the man inside that keeps running the iron cup across the bars go free. Haven't let the demons free to run alongside him and the wolves.
That crazy guy inside who is filled with battle lust really isn't crazy. He knows what he is doing and he just does it. Much of it is based upon instinct and split decisions that aren't weighed and measured a thousand different ways.
He is much more of a force of nature and exerts the kind of presence that you can't help but notice but the thing is that he doesn't care. And it is because he doesn't care that he is considered to be so magnetic by so many. He is me without care and without restriction.
And he is the driving force that pushes me towards you. He doesn't fear the flames of passion or worry about the consequences of what happens if you don't respond. Ask him about it and he'll tell you to shut up and stop worrying. Push him and he'll say that he doesn't worry about things that haven't happened or that are too hard to predict.
He swears that you feel it all and that your piece of the puzzle draws you closer just as ours does. He says that only a fool plays to lose and that is what he accuses me of doing.
I grab him by the collar and shake him. I tell him not to fuck with me because he is me and I am him which is a convoluted way of saying that I am as smart/mean/crazy. He takes my hands off of his collar and answers me in a quiet and measured voice.
"You can't predict what a woman will do or what she will say because she doesn't know it either." I tell him that he is pushing tin can philosophy to the wrong guy and he asks me if I can live with myself without trying to get another shot.
"Who says that I am not trying to. But I can't make her love me if she won't."
He chuckles, closes his eyes and points to the sky. The moon is full and there are a million stars in the sky. "She is outside staring at the sky thinking about you. She won't admit it. She won't tell you that she keeps you in a place inside her heart that no one else has ever seen, but the fact is that she does. And that is why you need to have faith. Give her a reason to love you again and she will you give you more than you ever got before."
I can't help but smile at that because it makes sense and I know it is true. She wants me to give her a reason to let her heart open wide to me again. She has been fighting it because she can't see how to make it work and that is why she has been so cold.
Damn, if this isn't the craziest puzzle I have ever encountered. She is smarter than I am and far more clever, but I still know how to make her smile. And more importantly I know how to take care of her and make her feel warm, safe, loved and appreciated.
And that is part of it, if not all of it. If I can convince her to step into my arms the world will take care of the rest.
The crazy man smiles at me, claps me on the back and starts running. I join him step for step and when we head over the cliff I smile because I know that we are going to learn how to fly on the way down because that is just what will happen.
Your Songwriter
Dear woman,
That is sort of a nondescript way of addressing you now isn't it. I could be far more direct and make it clear to all who read this exactly who it is I am speaking to, because I am most certainly speaking.
You may be reading these words but I know you inside out and even after all of this time I know that when you read my words you hear my voice. You hear my voice and feel my presence and it makes you feel warm, loved and confused.
The logic and reason with which you want to view the world won't work here. I know because I ask for them to do so too. I look at math and science and search for something that makes sense of this crazy confusion. There are no theorems or proofs to apply. Newton can't explain it and Faraday can't diagram it.
But I know that you are the song of my heart and that once you said I was the love of your life. And I know that the song of my heart still remembers the love of her life in ways that cannot be broken or forgotten. It is kind of infuriating, is it not.
I remember the day you told me that it was a tragedy that we couldn't be together. I told you that you were wrong and you were silent. You didn't believe me because you didn't want to. You told me that I only hear what I want to hear.
And what I hear is your heart calling to mine. What I hear is our soul crying because neither one of us is completely fulfilled or experiencing the sort of joy that we know we can experience. We know because we have been there and we can be there again.
I am hard where you are soft and soft where you are hard. You make me feel things that sometimes I don't want to feel. So I find the dark places and remember the pain. I poke the bear and anger it so that I can be angry with you. I push so that I can create the space and feel ok with the empty spot that you once filled.
And in the midst of it all I feel you passing by and I look up and out the window. I hear soft chimes and smell...you. I feel your hand in mine and your lips upon me and I feel like I am back in high school again. I can't get up to answer the question my teacher asked.
So I sit here and wonder what would happen if we were to be alone. I think back upon the moments and know that I can still make you feel the same things you felt before. Your body will respond to my touch, but that would mean opening your heart to mine.
And I sit here and wish that I knew how to write the music I hear in my heart every time I think of you. And I sit here and think about the girl who loved a boy who wanted to do nothing more than take care of her. And I sit here and wonder if my heart is right and if we'll get that moment together....again.
Because life is short and when you find someone who can do for you what we did for each other, well you do all that you can to tend to that garden. So I sit here and wonder what it will take to earn the opportunity to park my car in your garage again.
Should I be the boy who loved the girl or the man who told the woman that he wasn't going to take her crap anymore. Should I tell you that I love you still and ask for your hand or come out and say that only a stubborn fool would ignore the opportunity.
Doors open and doors close but I am not the kind of guy who is afraid to tear down a wall or climb over a fence.
We were more together than we are apart.
That is sort of a nondescript way of addressing you now isn't it. I could be far more direct and make it clear to all who read this exactly who it is I am speaking to, because I am most certainly speaking.
You may be reading these words but I know you inside out and even after all of this time I know that when you read my words you hear my voice. You hear my voice and feel my presence and it makes you feel warm, loved and confused.
The logic and reason with which you want to view the world won't work here. I know because I ask for them to do so too. I look at math and science and search for something that makes sense of this crazy confusion. There are no theorems or proofs to apply. Newton can't explain it and Faraday can't diagram it.
But I know that you are the song of my heart and that once you said I was the love of your life. And I know that the song of my heart still remembers the love of her life in ways that cannot be broken or forgotten. It is kind of infuriating, is it not.
I remember the day you told me that it was a tragedy that we couldn't be together. I told you that you were wrong and you were silent. You didn't believe me because you didn't want to. You told me that I only hear what I want to hear.
And what I hear is your heart calling to mine. What I hear is our soul crying because neither one of us is completely fulfilled or experiencing the sort of joy that we know we can experience. We know because we have been there and we can be there again.
I am hard where you are soft and soft where you are hard. You make me feel things that sometimes I don't want to feel. So I find the dark places and remember the pain. I poke the bear and anger it so that I can be angry with you. I push so that I can create the space and feel ok with the empty spot that you once filled.
And in the midst of it all I feel you passing by and I look up and out the window. I hear soft chimes and smell...you. I feel your hand in mine and your lips upon me and I feel like I am back in high school again. I can't get up to answer the question my teacher asked.
So I sit here and wonder what would happen if we were to be alone. I think back upon the moments and know that I can still make you feel the same things you felt before. Your body will respond to my touch, but that would mean opening your heart to mine.
And I sit here and wish that I knew how to write the music I hear in my heart every time I think of you. And I sit here and think about the girl who loved a boy who wanted to do nothing more than take care of her. And I sit here and wonder if my heart is right and if we'll get that moment together....again.
Because life is short and when you find someone who can do for you what we did for each other, well you do all that you can to tend to that garden. So I sit here and wonder what it will take to earn the opportunity to park my car in your garage again.
Should I be the boy who loved the girl or the man who told the woman that he wasn't going to take her crap anymore. Should I tell you that I love you still and ask for your hand or come out and say that only a stubborn fool would ignore the opportunity.
Doors open and doors close but I am not the kind of guy who is afraid to tear down a wall or climb over a fence.
We were more together than we are apart.
He Tried To Forget Her
She was the one who came unsought and unseen into his life and turned it upside down. She was ready but he wasn't and then he was ready and she wasn't. It was an awkward dance of ups and downs and uncertainties. It was a time of change in many things and many places and it was never clear what was really going on.
And so they took a step back to look at their lives and to review what it was and what it was not. A seesaw is a great place for a child but not always as much fun for an adult and so it seemed that if they could not be then the best thing to do would be to walk away.
To walk away and say that if it was meant to be then somehow it would work out. He said it and he meant it but deep inside it never did take. Though he did his best to try and forget her there were always things to remind him that something was missing from his life.
It was a funny sort of realization because something had been missing from his life for a long time and her arrival in it had filled that spot. It was a hole that had been there for a long time, so long that he had become accustomed to its presence.
And when he realized that it had been filled he was excited and thrilled in all sorts of ways. There was real joy in the knowledge that someone could still do that to him because he had convinced himself that it could not and would not happen.
It is probably why her absence from his life was so difficult. Think of the stories of man stealing fire from the gods and what would happen if it was stolen back. A fundamental part of your life, part of the trunk of the tree was gone.
Loss is one of those funny thing. Sometimes you don't appreciate what you have until it is gone. Sad, trite, but true.
And so he did his best to forget her. He found way to fill his days and when his thoughts drifted off he did his best to think of her negative traits. This proved to me moderately successful because though he could some up with a list he would find himself thinking about all of the good things.
It wasn't a case of denial, just reality. That was the problem. He wasn't romanticizing. He wasn't ,pretending and that is in large part why it was so hard. Inside he knew. He just knew.
For now he can't live with her and he can't live without her. Though there is no doubt that he is capable and able of walking alone and living a life in which there is no engagement with her ever again he doesn't really believe that to be the case. He doesn't really think that this is how it will go.
Because he knows that some nights when he stares out at the moon and thinks about her she is thinking about him. Because he knows that somewhere she is fighting the same battle as he is, albeit in a different place.
It had a crazy start to it, their relationship. But if there is one simple truth that they learned it was that the kiss that they used to kid around about was true. One simple kiss and it was all over.
One kiss that made it clear that sometimes there really are two people who belong together because they have what it takes to complete each other. One kiss made the impossible turn into the improbable and set off hope for the future.
So in his quiet moments of frustration he may curse the day that it happened he silently gives it his blessing. And he smiles at the moon and looks out at the sky and waits for a day that he hopes will come sooner than later.
Sometimes it is no more complicated than saying a boy loves a girl and a girl loves a boy and all that they ask for is the chance to somehow share that love.
Dreams of a future built upon hope and a memory. Fragments of a life that could have been built together and may still yet be are seen through the mist. Because if he can't forget her than what else can he do.
The words above are part of a story I started that for now has no end. I have lots of other bits and pieces that I have written but I haven't figured out how to put them together. It is not because I don't have any ideas but because each time I do I decide that I don't like it so I pull it apart.
It is all tied into the story that I am working on here. I have this dream that I am going to figure out how to tie it together and turn it into something amazing. I have this dream that this is going to be the first of many books and that 2012 will be part of something special, significant and amazing.
So now I am working on ways to turn the dream into reality and trying hard to make hope something more than smoke in the air.
This is part of the Just Write project. You can find more information about it over here. If you like what you read you can find more information about me over here.
And so they took a step back to look at their lives and to review what it was and what it was not. A seesaw is a great place for a child but not always as much fun for an adult and so it seemed that if they could not be then the best thing to do would be to walk away.
To walk away and say that if it was meant to be then somehow it would work out. He said it and he meant it but deep inside it never did take. Though he did his best to try and forget her there were always things to remind him that something was missing from his life.
It was a funny sort of realization because something had been missing from his life for a long time and her arrival in it had filled that spot. It was a hole that had been there for a long time, so long that he had become accustomed to its presence.
And when he realized that it had been filled he was excited and thrilled in all sorts of ways. There was real joy in the knowledge that someone could still do that to him because he had convinced himself that it could not and would not happen.
It is probably why her absence from his life was so difficult. Think of the stories of man stealing fire from the gods and what would happen if it was stolen back. A fundamental part of your life, part of the trunk of the tree was gone.
Loss is one of those funny thing. Sometimes you don't appreciate what you have until it is gone. Sad, trite, but true.
And so he did his best to forget her. He found way to fill his days and when his thoughts drifted off he did his best to think of her negative traits. This proved to me moderately successful because though he could some up with a list he would find himself thinking about all of the good things.
It wasn't a case of denial, just reality. That was the problem. He wasn't romanticizing. He wasn't ,pretending and that is in large part why it was so hard. Inside he knew. He just knew.
For now he can't live with her and he can't live without her. Though there is no doubt that he is capable and able of walking alone and living a life in which there is no engagement with her ever again he doesn't really believe that to be the case. He doesn't really think that this is how it will go.
Because he knows that some nights when he stares out at the moon and thinks about her she is thinking about him. Because he knows that somewhere she is fighting the same battle as he is, albeit in a different place.
It had a crazy start to it, their relationship. But if there is one simple truth that they learned it was that the kiss that they used to kid around about was true. One simple kiss and it was all over.
One kiss that made it clear that sometimes there really are two people who belong together because they have what it takes to complete each other. One kiss made the impossible turn into the improbable and set off hope for the future.
So in his quiet moments of frustration he may curse the day that it happened he silently gives it his blessing. And he smiles at the moon and looks out at the sky and waits for a day that he hopes will come sooner than later.
Sometimes it is no more complicated than saying a boy loves a girl and a girl loves a boy and all that they ask for is the chance to somehow share that love.
Dreams of a future built upon hope and a memory. Fragments of a life that could have been built together and may still yet be are seen through the mist. Because if he can't forget her than what else can he do.
++++
It is all tied into the story that I am working on here. I have this dream that I am going to figure out how to tie it together and turn it into something amazing. I have this dream that this is going to be the first of many books and that 2012 will be part of something special, significant and amazing.
So now I am working on ways to turn the dream into reality and trying hard to make hope something more than smoke in the air.
This is part of the Just Write project. You can find more information about it over here. If you like what you read you can find more information about me over here.
Just Write Boychik
It is pushing midnight but I am still awake. Still here at my keyboard searching for the keystrokes that will bring you closer to where I am and where we were.
Unsure and uncertain of how to find them I go back in time to the songs we listened to and hope that music helps to reconnect and recreate the magic of the day and the music of the night.
I do it because I promised to be your hero. I took the vow and swore the oath that will not let me rest. I fight the battles and go to war each day because there are no alternatives for me. It is not hype nor melodrama. I feel and hear the sound of that drummer and I dance because that is what is required.
But I do it with hope and a full heart. I am alone and apart because that is how I choose to be. I choose to remember and to believe in a past and a future that none could have predicted or imagined.
Let others live the life that is dictated by those who haven't the will to chase their true desire. That is not I and that is not you. Perhaps it is what we chose to do or how we chose to live for a time but it isn't who we are.
My heart and my head know better and so does yours. Each day I knock on your door and ask for your hand. Each day I remind you that once a girl let a boy love her and that he would do so again.
Not because of fear or obligation- but because he wants to and so does she. All I ask of you is to live one life together. We who are more together than apart can do what we choose and find a way to overcome the obstacles that exist.
This is a short post I wrote as part of the Just Write project. It was part of a warm up for the story that I am working on over here. If you are interested in reading more of my writing you can always try my main blog.
It is A Constant Source of Amusement
I am a big fan of Letters of Note. It is a constant source of amusement. I loved the response that Saroyan got about wanting to become an editor:
I note what you say about your aspiration to edit a magazine. I am sending you by this mail a six-chambered revolver. Load it and fire every one into your head.Classic.
How Many Blogs Must A Man Write
Jimmy killed himself 11 years ago or maybe it was 12, I am not really sure. I know for certain when Max died because it was the Fall of 1989 when he decided that life wasn't worth living.
Join us at Just Write.
Been thinking about suicide quite a bit. Been wondering how you get to that dark place where you can't see daylight or feel the warmth of the sun. It is not because I have any desire to end my life because that is not remotely close.
We all have our troubles and I feel like I have received a double dose but I never seriously considered ending things. Strange to think about how many people I know who have because I can name a few more beyond those two.
I wasn't particularly close with any of them but I spent a lot of time with Max and Jimmy. We went to the same summer camps and participated in the same youth groups. Happy talk, isn't it, these musings about death.
*****
Been thinking about the various places in which I publish and wondering if it makes sense to have so many different outposts. I set them up with good reason and did my best to make them work for my purposes but things change. People change.
I have changed.
Most of my time is spent here. It is where I focus my energy but I can't quite this place up. There is too much wrapped up here, too many memories and good times. It is like my Tara, but I can't make it what it was. I can't chase the ghosts of the past because it prevents me from truly living in the present where I need to be.
What you see here and in the other places you may visit are parts and pieces of me. It is not a complete representation of who I am. Writing reveals much but not all and it would be a mistake to forget that.
Still there are stories to be told and tales to be had so I am off and running to find my best scribe and accumulate that which I can. It would please me greatly if you would come visit me at my main home.
Blogging 2012
2012.
Every time I type that out I find myself shaking my head and wondering how this little corner of cyberspace has managed to survive for so long.
This may it will be 8 years since I opened up this place and I can't imagine life without it. This blog may not be my primary residence online any more but it is my retreat and somewhere that I visit because it is like a home that forever welcomes me with open arms.
Here is where I have loved and lost. Here is where it all started but not where it ends, at least not yet. That is a story that has yet to be told and I can only hope that when it does it will be an epic adventure worthy of all that I wish for it.
This joint will continue to be a repository of thoughts and ideas. It will continue to serve as another place to write and share pieces of passion and personality. Some will be fiction and some will not. It remains to be seen whether I will share which is what.
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